Historical Reenactment : a fish out of the water
by Aeph
Summary: Everyone's now living in the human world, and Alphys has invited Undyne to a nerdy night of entertainment. Undyne is pretty confident that she'll manage whatever comes her way, but the proud warrior will soon discover that she may be in over her head when the dice start rolling...
1. Chapter 1

Prequel to this story : s/11777154/1/A-History-Conference

Undyne rang the laboratory's doorbell with confidence. She patted the bundle under her arm : this time, she hadn't forgot the giant sword. She was also wearing a human armor made out of plastic and fiberglass. The fake metal glimmered in New Hotlands' lava-illuminated air.

 _Good thing I brought all that water, too. I'm cooking in there._ There was indeed a faint, delicious smell of fried fish coming from her. Some of the volcano's lesser creatures were beginning to take notice : glowing, hungry little eyes staring at her from under the scorched rocks.

This location in the human world was surprisingly like the original Hotlands back in the underground : it was just like Alphys to find a way to establish her new laboratory someplace like this. Now that everyone was on the surface, she and Undyne could have gone to a nice place, built a house on some sunny shore with plenty of water around and lived there together or something, but noooo. It had to be galeries inside a fricking VOLCANO. And they still weren't living together. What was up with that ? She thought she'd DECLARED back in the junkyard, but Alphys had backpedaled since. They were closer than ever before thanks to the human, almost acting like a couple, but… Well, Alphys gotta be Alphys.

Oh, well. Undyne couldn't wait to spend the night alone with her, talking about humans and their incredible battles. Maybe watch a few anime documentaries, snuggled against each other on the couch. Now that they were in the human world and getting proper internet, Alphys must have a kiloton of new stuff to watch. Her friend had mentioned something about "reenactment", tonight, too, and had even made her fill up some sort of form. Classic Alphys, taking everything so seriously and with such intensity : she'd be damned if she didn't match the scientist's commitment tonight. So she had come prepared.

The door slid open with a beep and she dived in with relief. The a/c felt like a benevolent god softly blowing upon her face as she stood proudly in the hallway, fists on her hips. The giant screen a few steps away was showing an image of her and enhanced the effect quite satisfyingly.

"I'm here and I'm ready !" she bellowed.

But nobody came.

"We're all upstairs" shouted a voice.

 _Hey, that wasn't Alphys._

"Wait a second" she hissed, running up the escalator (really, this place was EXACTLY THE SAME). "Papyrus ? Mettaton ? WHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING HERE OH MY GOD WHAT ABOUT OUR SPECIAL TIME ALPHYS WHY ARE THEY HERE"

Sure enough, the skeleton and the robot were chilling on the couch. Papyrus had a huge grin. Given that he was a skeleton, he couldn't help it, but still, Undyne squinted to see if there was impudence in his smile. But no : he still looked as innocently cheerful as ever.

"I didn't see your ludicrous red car outside" she spat, still mad.

"It's parked in the lab's garage. You wouldn't believe what such heat does to a paintjob !"

Alphys turned from the table on which she was arranging bowls of various snacks.

"Oh hey Undyne, I'm glad you're… Huh. What are you wearing ?"

Undyne realised nobody else was wearing historical human warrior replicas. Mettaton wore nothing, since he was a robot, Alphys had her usual labcoat and Papyrus his standard issue armor. _I swear he sleeps in it, too,_ Undyne told herself not for the first time.

"Well, huh, you mentioned.. reenactment… So I thought it would be like that human convention ages ago. Remember ?"

Alphys stared at her.

"But I mean, without the actual fighting with Asgore and destroying everything around us, obviously, heh, heheh…um."

The lizard hugged her. "You're so cute, thanks for coming." She released her. "But no, we're not doing that. Not exactly at least." She gestured at a free spot on the couch. "Just sit down please. Did you bring your character sheet ?"

Undyne rummaged in her pocket and fished out a crumpled, badly-folded paper. "You mean the registration form ? Here it is."

Alphys made a choking sound and took the paper. She seemed on the verge of tears. "What on earth did you do with it ? Is that _melted butter_ ? And.. oh no, you… you filled it WITH A PEN ?"

"Well, I..."

"I specifically said _no pen, use a pencil._ I really did !" Alphys didn't exactly shout, but she sounded quite upset.

"That's right Undyne darling, the email said _no pen_ , come on" said Mettaton.

"You don't fill a character sheet with a pen, silly" added Papyrus. "Then you can't erase stuff."

"YOU TWO ! You know what this is all about ?" asked Undyne, a dangerous edge creeping in her voice.

"Sure" said Mettaton, briefly dancing around the table then sitting back on the couch. "It's gaming night. We're going to play some tabletop rpg."

"WELCOME TO THE GROUP !" Shouted Papyrus.


	2. Chapter 2

"This is not working out as I thought it would" observed Undyne.

She was sitting at the table with Papyrus and Mettaton. Alphys was here too. She was half-hidden by a cardboard screen and just stared past them wordlessly, sweating bullets, her eyes unfocused. She'd been like this for twenty good minutes. Twenty minutes of utter paralysed silence, and it was beginning to look like they were heading for another twenty minutes like this, maybe more.

"What's wrong with her ?" whispered Undyne to her friends, unwilling to talk too loudly and risk breaking something in Alphys' mind, whatever was going on in there.

"It's as I feared" finally said the robot. "She was a good game master online, but now that we're all physically here she's just old socially awkward Alphys again."

"Online ?" asked Undyne. "You mean you never played in person ?"

"No" said Papyrus. "We had a lot of fun together playing online in an undernet chatroom, before we all went to the surface. A few days ago she proposed to resume the game and demanded that you play with us. For some reason she insisted that it would be a good occasion to finally play all together in the same room."

"I'M SORRY EVERYONE, I, I RU… RUIN.. R R R…" It was Alphys, and she was shaking so hard now that a few dice rolled out of the table.

"Hey, hey, calm down Alphys, it's ok !" said Undyne, and she rushed in to comfort her friend. The scientist fell into her arms buried her face in her chest. Undyne felt herself blushing like crazy and hoped that nobody noticed. Mettaton was just smiling at her, his face unreadable, and Papyrus was picking his nose absent-mindedly with a bony finger.

"I'm sorry I ruined game ni-i-i-ight" sobbed Alphys. She was blowing her nose in Undyne's shirt now, who suddenly felt significantly less moved.

"My pretties, I think I have a solution" finally said Mettaton.

"Whu.. whu.." stammered Alphys, her vision blurry with tears.

"I think I know someone who could be the GM."

Papyrus looked at him. "You do ?"

"Yep. He's been aching to for some time, too. Ever since I started telling him about our online sessions."

"Is it the human ?" asked Undyne.

"No, I asked but they said they weren't into tabletop gaming." The robot shrugged. "Also, now that they're living with Toriel, I'm pretty sure she wouldn't let them approach a place like THE INSIDE OF A VOLCANO."

They all shook their heads.

"So, what do you say, Alphys ? Is that ok with you ?"

Alphys snorted one last time and wiped her eyes clean. "I.. I don't know… Who is it ? Wouldn't it be better if YOU were the GM ?"

But Papyrus intervened. "Alphys ! What are you saying ? Mettaton, not a player ? How can I play Impact the mighty paladin if his friend Lucida the fabulous bard isn't here ? He's essential ! It's bad enough that Sans stopped playing because he was banned from making puns and got bored..."

Undyne looked surprised. "Wait, Mettaton plays a musician ?"

They both looked at her. "Well he's more like a performer, but yeah, why ?"

"Nothing, I just... I thought he'd do something different than what he actually is in real life."

"You can do anything you want in roleplaying games !"

"Including what you're already doing in life !"

"Ok, ok, I get the point !"

She fell silent for a moment, then turned to Alphys. "You should say yes." She declared confidently. "I'd love to have you on my team. We'll have fun."

Alphys smiled and finally nodded at Mettaton. "Ok then. Do we wait until next week ?"

The robot did a happy spin. "No need ! I can text him and he'll be here in an hour or two."

"Oh well then. That's enough time to rewrite Undyne's sheet. With a PENCIL" said Alphys with a sharp glance at Undyne "and then watch an episode or two of Lodoss. To get in the mood."


End file.
